Land Transaction Tax and Anti-avoidance of Devolved Taxes (Wales) Act 2017 section Schedule 2 paragraph 13

Free-standing transfers as pre-completion transactions

Schedule 2 paragraph 13 sets out how land transaction tax applies when a pre-completion transaction takes the form of a free-standing transfer, covering the treatment of consideration and the circumstances in which the original contract is treated as substantially performed.

• When a transferee acquires the property under a free-standing transfer, the consideration for that acquisition must include the consideration given for the free-standing transfer itself, even if it would not normally be counted.
• If the transferee, their assignee, or a person connected with either of them takes possession of all or substantially all of the property that was the subject of the original contract, this is treated as substantial performance of that original contract.
• Where a single free-standing transfer relates to more than one contract (for example, in a chain of successive free-standing transfers), each contract is treated as a separate "original contract" and the substantial performance rule applies independently to each one.
• An assignee of the transferee means anyone who, through an assignment of rights relating to the free-standing transfer, becomes entitled to call for a transfer of the whole or part of the property, including persons connected with that assignee.